Your description looks fine Chris (as does the lollipop), lollipops were made for many years in a variety of 'styles' and colours. Given that the final colour could be somewhat random because of the effect of the silver chlorides used there will be plenty of variation between examples.

I think the distance selling regulations apply to business sellers and buy it now listings (business or private sellers).

I would recommend photographing against a plain white background in daylight, then buyers should not have any surprises when their item arrives. If the buyer insists on a refund make sure you (and the buyer) proceed according to ebay's terms and conditions for refunds.

hi thereIm no expert but am a collector of Mdina and have had a couple of hundreds of pieces over the years.I would say this IS NOT a fake, Mdina lollipops did come in different sizes and shape (obviously being handmade no two where the same) and colour variations.Ive never heard of "fake Mdina" in the sense of pieces being made/copied to fool/decieve, there are quite a lot with fake signitures though.Also there is not enough value in a lollipop so why go to all the effort to make a fake??To be honest i think your buyer is talking utter rubbish, ive seen them bright blue to deep sea green and almost all the sandy ochre colour tooI know exactly what you mean with regards to the whole treading carefully part though, i received a negative for a 1mm internal airbubble in a whitefriar vase (which i think sold for around £10) even after i had offered a full refund and it was declinedHopefully it all turns out well in the endmichelle

It's not a "fake", it's absolutely, 100% genuine Mdina. Christine's right about colour variation, it depends on how deep the colour of glass melted in *that* pot was, the amount of silver chloride in it, and how that reacts with both the blue and the clear glass. Every piece of Mdina is different, and the colours are often very different too.The silver chloride is horribly expensive nowadays, I know of no fake bits coming in from anywhere - I don't think it's raising good enough prices for anybody to be going to the expense of faking it. This is a Michael Harris design, a highly desirable one, and it continued to be made for a while after he left. Your buyer got it quite cheaply - not long ago, these were regularly raising ~£75.

There are a lot of fake signatures now, some better than others. Many, you can tell just by the incorrect spelling of "Michael". There is an image of this style of "Cut-ice lollipop" on p.51 of Mark Hill's book; "Michael Harris: Mdina Glass & Isle of Wight Studio Glass". Interestingly, the image in the book has been taken under the same lighting conditions as this piece, so they do look very similar indeed. It will look quite different under different lighting conditions.

I can't advise you what to do about your buyer though. Send them here?Would you need the word of Mark Hill or Ron Wheeler to give the attribution complete authority?

Your item is not misdescribed, it is absolutely correct.

Logged

Cheers, Sue (M)

Three Wise Women would have asked for directions, arrived on time, delivered the baby, cleaned the stables and made a casserole...

Refund the money. The buyer should pay shipping and it better not come back damaged! Then offer it to the second chance bidder stating the first bidder stating the 'winner' didn't want it. It's a hassle yes but it's not a HUGE money deal.

Even with that said.. With as many feedbacks as you have I wouldn't worry about a bad one. There's many boneheaded new ebay buyers that have left unwarranted negative feedback and we all know eBay has tipped that scale to the buyers side. Anyone looking at feedback will look for trends not the oddball one in a thousand.

I will give you £36 and P&P for it. Rons your man. He's at the New Forrest Show until tomorrow but drop him a line and he will authenticate it for you. www.artiusglass.co.uk. He will give him chapter and verse and will be begging for mercy after about the 14th paragraph.

The item is 100% as described and therefore doesn't require a refund. If its because he doesn't like it then thats a matter of how nice and honest he is with you. Have you asked him where the statement 'Forgery' comes from?Give him a link to the GMB.Don't worry yourself over it Its just not worth it.Mike www.abfabglass.co.uk

For what it is worth, and I can not attest to the authenticity of the vase, but as a buyer and seller on ebay, a negative or two on a seller would never deter me from buying.... unless they only had a feedback or two .

After having dealt with the human race in retail for as long as I did, you can not please all of the people all of the time.....

The fact of the matter is that if you do give a refund and don't pay return postage, the buyer can still leave a neg and there is nothing you can do about it....

Do not be held hostage by the threat of a negative... many sellers do the "right thing" and get negs from the buyer anyway.... You see it all the time if you read feedback.....

If the product is right, move on, besides, you could get a different piece back and they have proof of return for a package.... then you are out money and the product..... seen that happen also.... unfortunately, some buyers (scammers) will try every trick in the book.... sad but true.....

It may be that the buyer is just feeling insecure about the purchase. It happened to me today, so I can relate. Chris, if you could assure him that it is Mdina and tell him to take a few days to verify, you will guarantee the purchase. It may be that the vase was just surprisingly bright and shiny.

(My purchase is still under question. I'll post it to the board in a few days. I decided to keep it just for the research potential. The seller didn't do anything wrong in my case.)

Not a trader, more a friend of collectors and finder of 'rare' and beautiful piece's , sorry if I came across that way, I have been called 'tactless' many times :sun:cheers Chris

Chris, firstly I agree with the others, there's nothing at all wrong with your vase. However, I would like to just challenge you on the statement you made above. What do you mean by that exactly? If you're selling your own personal possessions that you've accumulated over time then yes, you're a private trader - if however you're selling things you've bought specifically to sell on then I'm afraid that does indeed make you a business trader and, as such, you have obligations to your buyers that you wouldn't have otherwise.

Selling online as a business means you must refund your buyers in full for whatever reason, no quibble - the issue of who pays the return postage depends on a number of factors including the reason why it's been returned however many business traders would cover this cost also as a gesture of goodwill.